Exactly zero men on PrEP contract HIV in 2.5-year study

After two and a half years of trials, a new study has found no new HIV infections among a group of people on pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP). For 32 months, researchers at the Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in San Francisco tracked the health of over 600 people as they used Truvada daily to prevent the virus in a real-world setting.

The average age of the study participants was 37, and 99 percent were men who have sex with men. The average length of individual usage was 7.2 months. Members of this group also reported a higher likelihood of having multiple sex partners than those not using PrEP. No one in the study contracted HIV.

Lead author Jonathan Volk, a physician at Kaiser Permanente San Francisco, emphasized that this is the first time such a study has been done in a clinical practice setting at this size. The findings were published Wednesday in Clinical Infectious Diseases, a leading journal of studies on infection disease.

The medical staff at the Pitt Men’s Study emphasize that PrEP is not a substitute for condoms. It should be used in addition to condoms, to further reduce your risk. It is also important to note that PrEP doesn’t protect against other STDs like syphilis, chlamydia, and gonorrhea. To learn more about PrEP, check out the CDC’s Website. If you have questions about PrEP, you can speak to your doctor. You can also call the PrEP clinic at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center: (412) 647-0996.